Glossary

Firewall

Firewalls are used by network operators as protection against unauthorised external access. This involves a whole bundle of hardware and software actions and technologies that monitor and control the data flow between the private network to be protected and an unprotected network such as the Internet.

See also NATFlat rate

Flat rate is a particular billing system for Internet connections. The Internet Provider charges a monthly fee regardless of the duration and number of logins.

Full duplex

Data transmission mode in which data can be sent and received at the same time. See also Half duplex

Gateway

A gateway is a device for connecting networks with completely different architectures (addressing, protocols, application interfaces etc.). Although it is not totally correct, the term is also used as a synonym for Router.

Global IP addressSee Public IP addressHalf duplex

Operating mode for data transfer. Only one party can receive or send data at a time. See also Full duplex

HTTP Proxy

An HTTP proxy is a Server that network components use for their Internet traffic. All requests are sent via the proxy.

Hub

A Hub connects several network components in a star-topology network by sending all the data it receives from one network component to all the other network components.

See also: Switch, Bridge, Router, Gateway

IEEE

Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers

The IEEE is an international body for defining network standards, especially for standardising LAN technologies, transmission protocols and speeds and wiring.

IEEE 802.11

IEEE 802.11 is a standard for wireless LANs operating in the 2.4 GHz band. In so-called Infrastructure mode, terminals can be connected to a base station (Access Point) or they can connect with each other spontaneously (Ad-hoc mode).

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